


A Shadow on the Wall

by Lavender_Fields



Category: Game of Thrones (TV), Greek and Roman Mythology
Genre: Character Death, Dark, F/M, Kidnapping, Post-Season/Series 07 Finale
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-02
Updated: 2017-09-01
Packaged: 2018-12-22 10:24:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11965455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lavender_Fields/pseuds/Lavender_Fields
Summary: Petyr Baelish, now God of the Underworld, sets out to kidnap the woman he fell in love with to make her his Queen. Although Sansa Stark won’t admit it, perhaps her place is truly meant to be by his side....





	A Shadow on the Wall

**Author's Note:**

> This is all inspired by a wonderful tumblr prompt by 'the-girl-who-swaiting'! More to come soon.

The Lord of Light was said to have plans for them all. While alive, Petyr Baelish had heard whispers of His power in every land, but paid little mind to the preachings of the red women, or to the wild claims of His devoted followers. Ned Stark's bastard was even said to have been resurrected from death by The Lord's power, but prophecies were tales used to lift Kings and Leaders into legends, nothing more. 

Still, whether it was the Lord of Light, or The Mother’s Mercy, or even The Old Gods, something had lifted Petyr Baelish from perpetual darkness and stretching silence, and placed him aware and alive among the realm of the dead. The souls around him were lost, vacant shells. Their eyes, grey and far away, though their bodies were whole again. There was no blood, no pain, only drifting bodies and sunken features. He alone seemed immune to the tranquilized state of death.

Petyr was to find little comfort in the wandering figures around him, as words or sound never seemed to pass through their thin lips. His own last words felt as if they too died with him, their spirits hanging perpetual on his tongue. In this lost time trapped among the forgotten dead, Petyr thought of Sansa. He thought of the defiant look in her eyes as she had sentence him to this hollow existence, and of the way her hair had fallen like a river of fire down her back. The young woman had grown strong, stronger than he ever imagined the young wolf would be able to. Strong like her mother. 

As time passed, Petyr was to find that the surrounding figures would part ways for him as he travelled further and further into this dark world. He alone seemed to be driven with purpose- the single rushing force in an otherwise still river of souls. Whether the bodies could recognize this or not, he didn’t know, but they would break from their trances and lock cold eyes with him as he passed. Perhaps these were all the people he had harmed in his lifetime. Perhaps this was hell- his sentence for the misery he had set upon the world. Perhaps it was his penance to spend eternity searching for some unnamed desire as he did now.

Time moved without meaning and Lord Baelish wandered without change. Each face he passed blended in with the next until he could hardly tell the difference between child and parent, woman or man. It was only when, upon circumstance, his gaze was drawn forward to a pair of still silhouettes that he felt the awakening of new passing thought. A mother and son, quite clearly; though Lord Baelish couldn’t quite explain how he knew. The boy was unfamiliar- a bed of dark curls atop his head and a defeated set to his shoulders. The woman, on the other hand, was one that Petyr would recognize anywhere, even in the land of the dead. Catelyn.

Even still, with the woman he had loved so many years ago standing before him, Petyr felt nothing. Nothing, but a pulling emptiness at meeting sights with her again. She was still beautiful, but the light of life had drained from her, and the thin vessel left behind held no draw as the living Catelyn Tully had. She and Rob Stark were huddled close together, acting just the same as they had in their final moments. Petyr barely felt even a twinge of pity. 

 

"Where are my children?"

 

Catelyn voice broke the eternal silence, no recognition flashing in her eyes.  The sound was foreign and strange to Lord Baelish. Perhaps even, off putting. The desperate plea of a grieving mother elicited no regret or sadness from the man, and he stood his ground without mercy in his heart.   

 

"They're not of this realm, Catelyn. It wasn't their time." 

 

Petyr replied with ease, finding his voice emerging smooth and full from his dead lips. His reply surprised even him. How long had he been existing in silence? 

 

"Bring me my children." 

 

Catelyn repeated, a bit stronger now. Petyr shook his head, outstretching his arms to show his own helplessness in the matter.

 

"I can't do that."

 

The spirit, as expressionless and vacant as the other hundreds Lord Baelish had passed, altered for a split moment. For a fleeting second in time, Catelyn’s tragic face shifted to that of confusion and anger. 

 

"Of course you can. You're the only one who can. Bring them to me."

 

"I don't understand."

 

Petyr admitted, his brow creased in frustration at the pleas. 

  
  


"You never did." 

 

Catelyn said frankly, before turning away and returning to Rob in silence, the two hovering close to one another without ever quite touching. 

 

__________________________________________________   
  


Time continued to pass, and Lord Baelish was soon to learn that he could speak easily with the once-silent ghosts around him, if only he reached out with his will.  Not only could he communicate with the surrounding ghosts, but he soon learned that the souls would respond to his calls. He could bid them to his side and have them spill their secrets into his waiting ear. Alone in the eternal world, Lord Baelish learned about the affairs of kings and the historic treacheries of men.  
  


Soon, his desires were at his fingertips. He had imagined and resurrected a great throne- as towering and sharp as The Iron Throne- encrusted with Obsidian stone and rigid bones. He called to his side the great beasts that were once loyal to the Stark’s to guard his place, and as a symbol of his reign. The direwolves- once called Grey Wind, Summer, and Lady- had continued to grow in death, and towered over the shoulders of even the tallest men in the underground. They stayed loyal at Lord Baelish’s side, and for once in his existence, Petyr felt the thrill of singular and absolute power.

 

Perhaps he was not a prisoner of this empty world, as he had once believed. Perhaps he was the ruler of it. And if he could control this underworld, then why should he not hold sway over the surface?

 

The thought had started weak- like the soft glow of a wick waiting to properly capture flame. Cateyln’s dead voice continued to sound in his head,

 

_ “Bring me my children.” _   


Perhaps the surface was apt to bend to his will as much as the underworld had. Perhaps, it was possible for him to return to the land of the living now that he had mastered the world below? With this singular thought in mind, Petyr reached out into the darkness, setting his mind’s eye on one thing and one thing only. When he opened his eyes again, he saw light.

_____________________________________________________________

Sansa's dreams were often unkind relics of her past.  

 

Sometimes she would dream of Joffrey laughing atop The Iron Throne, the speared heads of her family frowning behind him. Not just her father, as she had seen in the waking world, but her mother too. Brothers and sister- their mutilated direwolves standing beside them even in death.  She would dream of Ramsey, and sometimes of his arrows, hunting her down in the forest; fleeing home only to find him waiting for her there as well.  She would dream of her Aunt Lysa, and see herself being pushed through the Moon Door in her place. 

Sansa learned to accept these visions as part of her life, now. Each replayed and warped memory a reminder of what made her strong. She learned not to shy away from their horrors, lest they gain control over her again. Fear had no place in the heart of a wolf. 

That was why on this night, when dreams of jealous kings and scornful widows nestled their way into her sleep, Sansa did not turn away. Run though she may from the knights with brandished swords, she did not weep. She ran until their armour dissolved to dust and their swords became the tall trees at High Garden and her feet were no longer running down cobblestones but safely planted on cool grass. She was left calm, looking out into the sea. 

Sometimes Margery would meet her here, other times she would sit alone and find solace in the feel of a warm breeze on her skin. On this night, she was alone. She breathed in the ghost of salted air, hearing the calls of men sound across the water. When she opened her eyes to view sunkissed shores, her breath caught in her throat, and she lifted herself to her feet once more.

 

"No, you don't get to follow me here." 

 

Sansa whispered, wearing one of those same high dresses she had worn as a child in King’s Landing. Petyr Baelish stood several feet away, neck clean and unmarked by the slit Sansa had sentenced upon him all those months ago.   
  
“You tormented me long enough. You made me lose everything.”    


She continued, raising her chin and looking at the man squarely, using all her will to make the man disappear. The unwelcome figure stayed. 

 

“I forgive you, Sansa.” 

  
Lord Baelish spoke. Shaking her head slowly, Sansa began to back away from the man she had condemned.    
  


“I loved you as I loved no one else. Even sentencing me to death you were beautiful....”

 

He continued before Sansa was able to cut off his ringing voice.   
  


“Quiet! I don’t need to hear any more of your lies!”   
  


She spat, breaking gaze with his and lowering her eyes. Even now, in the thralls of anger and disgust, Sansa felt herself being pulled him by Lord Baelish’s careful words.

 

“They were lies to protect you. To rise you to your true place. You're meant for more than this. You know you are."

 

In waking life, these words may have been meaningless, but here in her slumber Sansa knew exactly what Petyr’s ghost was saying, and what he wanted from her.

 

"My place is here."

 

She declared, refusing to let herself surrender to Lord Baelish’s influence again.

 

"Here- On the distant shores of a foreign land? Even in dreams you can't return home."

 

He challenged. 

 

"No, you made quite sure of that when you betrayed my father and left our family to ruin."

 

"And yet here you still stand. You live among the dead already, Sansa. Why would you not come with me?"

 

He reached out then, slowly, as if he thought Sansa may startle and run as a deer would locked in the eyes of a lion. But Petyr was not a lion. He was neither wolf nor dragon nor stag. He was something more, now. Something with enough power to break through the barrier of the living and the dead, should he choose to. 

Sansa did not move, she did not flinch. She stood motionless as his fingers nearly brushed pale cheeks, before they were both flung back into their separate worlds- Sansa to her bed and Lord Baelish to his darkness.

___________________________________________________________________

 

It had worked. Somehow, Petyr had been able to see her face again- nearly touch her living skin with his own cold flesh. But it wasn’t enough. Sansa’s glowing life seemed all the brighter now that he was surrounded by darkness once again. He had spent long enough encased in shadow. 

Little Finger was not a good man. In his youth he had been fearful and sly. As a man, impulsive and self serving. None of that had not changed upon meeting his death. This afterlife had left him driven and full of life. Somehow, his golden tongue and twisted words were strong enough to pass through the misty consciousness of the departed. The dead listened to him, the living feared him. There had to be reason behind it. He knew not what God’s to thank, and so put the glory into himself. He was, after all, the only one with power among the land of spirits. 

Here, he was king. He alone could break the barrier between the living and the dead, and he would do as Catelyn had bid. He would bring the Stark child down into his realm to be with him once more. 

For, what good was a King without his bride? 

  
  
  
  



End file.
